" I wrote the past in characters
Of rock and fire the scroll,
The building in the coral sea,
The planting of the coal."
Emerson's "Song of Nature."
" Knowledge this man prizes best
Seems fantastic to the rest:
Pondering shadows, colours, clouds,
Grass-buds and caterpillar shrouds,
Boughs on which the wild bees settle,
Tints that spot the violet's petal."
Emerson's "Wood-Notes."
" It would be much if I could persuade some few working
naturalists to lay aside their technical lists and records of parish
distribution, and study the works of Nature with open eyes, seeking
above all things to know more of life in its infinitely varied forms.''
Professor Miall, F.R.S
" And what an opportunity is lost in that strangely prevalent
mania of childhood—the rage for collecting. To take only eggs and
coins, what would not systematic oversight, encouragement and adult
scientific assistance do for the development of the great biologist and
historical numismatist, if only the incipient taste and industry were grasped
in the day of their susceptible youth, and judiciously guided into the adult
capacities of manhood. But here, as everywhere, the primary has
become the secondary, and it is the latter we cultivate. For while we
devote hours to teaching the principles of biology out of books, the
innate taste which leads a child to study animal life at first hand is
either left to work out its own education, or at best looked upon
curiously, and rewarded with the casual praise reserved for an amiable
hobby."
" Modern Ideals of Education," by W. K. Hill, in "Contemporary
Review," October, 1896.